The ongoing impact of industrial action, coupled with many other operational factors, has made the achievement of the 65-week wait target more challenging for many systems.
Since the start of 2023/24, all four acute providers in Lancashire and South Cumbria Integrated Care System and the collaborative have worked together to develop a 65-week system capacity and demand forecasting tool that can help indicate specialities at risk of not achieving the 65-week waiting time standard, based on current activity levels and waiting list information. By doing this at a system level, it allows potential opportunities for mutual aid and a system response to be identified.
The tool is now beginning to change how the collaborative's mutual aid process runs. In the past, mutual aid meetings were more reactive, relying on a provider coming forward to share that they are facing a capacity challenge, whereas now the collaborative can identify whether there is a need for a system response earlier. The use of data also enables mutual aid discussions to be more objective and can provide providers with greater levels of assurance that they are not unintentionally passing a performance challenge from one provider to another